Jump to content
Objectivism Online Forum

Biden is our only hope, says Yaron Brook

Rate this topic


Recommended Posts

2 hours ago, Yes said:

The assumption being made here is that humans have no control over nature when it comes to one's right to live a healthy life.  And yes- one has a right to live a healthy life, free of infections.  Science has spent innumerable resources in developing those items which enable one to live out life in a healthy manner, whether by vaccines, treatments, drugs, or simple wellness measures.  I disagree there is an "assumption of natural risks"  as the awareness of natural risks comes with knowledge.  One's right to live a life of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" must include wellness.  And the government, in its mission to protect our rights, has to include protecting us from infectious diseases.

I define the government's mission more narrowly: its purpose is to protect our rights from the initiation of force (or indirect forms such as fraud or threats or theft etc.) by other people.

Toward this end, the government provides police, courts, and a military.

Being struck by lightning could end your life, but you don't have a "right" not to be struck by lightning. The police can't arrest a lightning bolt, you can't sue it, and the military can't fight a war against it.

Of course, if someone had the ability to cause you to be struck by lightning, you'd have the right to prevent them from doing that, and then the police or the military would be there to help you. (But if this person has no intention of using that ability, and he is not being careless, then nobody needs to do anything.)

Similarly, you have the freedom to do whatever you think is appropriate to reduce your risk of being struck by lightning, as long as it doesn't involve initiating force against anyone else. For example, if there's a big thunderstorm, you're free to stay inside. (If some contract requires you to go out into the lightning, then, well, you would have to have signed it, or else it wouldn't apply to you.)

If it were proved that you could save yourself from lightning strikes by carrying a special umbrella, you don't have the right to force anyone to provide you with that special umbrella. You can buy one, if you can afford it, or you can take your chances without it, which is the same thing you would have to do if no one else were around.

There is no right to enslave anybody else, even partially, no matter how advanced their knowledge is.

Edited by necrovore
Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Eiuol said:

You can disagree all you want, and that's perfectly fine.

But you're insinuating that DonAthos has been ensnared by Marxism, isn't a "real" Objectivist (which should be interpreted as you saying "you have the audacity to think for yourself and come to different conclusions than me, a Galt-fearing Objectivist?), and that being anywhere to the left of Trump makes him a subconscious leftist (as if everything is on a right-left dichotomy). At least if you're going to personally attack someone, use their name.

Necrovore and I disagreed and still talked without accusing each other of being manipulated by others or being disingenuous. Be more like that.

 

I’m not insinuating anything in particular about any specific member here, nor have I gone into the responses here in any great depth.  I haven’t even looked at the Necrevor discussion or anything earlier than Dupins post.

 I merely remind Dupin to deal with others according to what they are instead of what he would have hoped them to be.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, Yes said:

The assumption being made here is that humans have no control over nature when it comes to one's right to live a healthy life.

I haven't made that assumption.

5 hours ago, Yes said:

And yes- one has a right to live a healthy life, free of infections.

So if my girlfriend unintentionally infects me with the Wu (or any other contagious disease), has she violated my rights? What sort of punishment should she receive?

5 hours ago, Yes said:

I disagree there is an "assumption of natural risks"  as the awareness of natural risks comes with knowledge.

I see, you might be using a different definition of "assume" than I did.

2009214876_Screenshot_2020-10-27-12-47-232.png.ce2a26f944cde2aabc11a02be58ea984.png

Maybe you're using #1, whereas I was using #2. When you live in a society, you take (or accept) the natural risks inherent in that social condition.

Now if someone purposefully coughs in your face or spits in your food and makes you sick, that's much different than normal interactions like people talking to each other on the streets or lovers snuggling in bed. I don't think you sign up for being the victim of malicious actions when you live in society. Intentionally infecting someone should at least be a misdemeanor. But you don't have a right to stop people from peacefully living their lives, just because you are personally at risk of catching a disease from other people in society. If that were the case, we would need to quarantine everyone with the common cold every year.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

DonAthos,

I’m no fan of Bradley Thompson – he continues to defend Carl Barney and Richard Minns in that he blocked me on Twitter for bringing up their issues.  But to give credit where it’s due he has been promoting Trump this election.  For example this article, published in of all places The American Conservative:
Donald Trump and the Revolt of the Unseen
and part of the interview with Dave Rubin (39:40 to 41:45)
Historian: Correcting Myths of The Founding Fathers
Rubin Report  August  29th 2020 (reviewed here).  In the interview Thompson says:

Quote

... no politician in my lifetime, in fact I would say of the last 70 years, has done a more important job of going after the Deep State. The Deep State is something I think that is real, and the Deep State also includes the mainstream media.  And so Trump has launched a three and a half year assault on all of the certitudes and platitudes of the Deep State and I do think that’s been an extraordinarily important development in American political life.

For one of the ugliest aspects of the Deep State see the two articles referenced in my last post.

---------------------------------

Were it not for Trump the mainstream media would not be talking about immigration.  The public has always been against unrestricted immigration, Trump just jumped in front of a parade that has been on the march for a long time.

Is the public right?  There has been much debate in the Objectivist movement about immigration.  Your position is that:

Quote

Trump's stance on immigration is deeply immoral and a violation of fundamental rights. He ... continues to initiate the use of force against innocents ...

But I along with many others in Objectivist circles disagree.  Our position is that the alien who illegally crosses our border is the one initiating force against us and violating our rights.  I’m not going into the subject here, just pointing out that the answer to the immigration question isn’t as obvious as you seem to think.

---------------------------------

I did not say Rand would have endorsed Trump, period.  That’s a straw man easily knocked over.  I think she would have liked much about him, including his campaign against “Fake News.”  Recall that Rand strongly approved of Spiro Agnew’s counter-attack against the MSM of his day.  You’ll find a long quote of her on the subject in the Shysters article mentioned in an earlier post.

Look at Trump’s opponent.  I think Rand would have hated Biden far more than ever she did McGovern.  (McGovern’s politics may have been abysmal but at least personally he was a decent man.)

---------------------------------

You agree that Trump did good by ending an Obama regulation that forced low-income housing onto suburbs yet you aren’t satisfied because he didn’t put that good action in a broader philosophical context.  Most people here would have liked to have seen that too but we can still appreciate what he did.  I can't understand this perfectionist attitude, where no matter what good Trump does it doesn't matter because he doesn't know what he's doing on a higher intellectual level, therefore replace him with Biden, who does know what he's doing.

---------------------------------

I don’t see any obvious religious pandering in Trump’s Supreme Court appointments.  In the case of Barrett perhaps there was feminist pandering

Anyway, we are comparing Trump with Biden.  If Biden wins and manages to expand and pack the Supreme Court, will his appointments be better?  (A rhetorical question to end all rhetorical questions.)

---------------------------------

You insinuate that Russiagate is Fake News.  In fact it is the highest crime ever in U.S. history, an illegal attempt by men within the U.S. government itself to undo the election of a president.  Two of the best commentators  about it are Paul Craig Roberts and Stephen Cohen.

Edited by Dupin
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, StrictlyLogical said:

I merely remind Dupin to deal with others according to what they are instead of what he would have hoped them to be.

And he is responding to DonAthos, so your post is telling Dupin to deal with DonAthos according to what he is. So he is included among all the people you are talking about.

3 hours ago, StrictlyLogical said:

I haven’t even looked at the Necrevor discussion or anything earlier than Dupins post.

If you did, you would realize that you inadvertently made a personal attack on DonAthos. Try to be aware when you are demonizing the people around you, even if you don't mean to. 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, Dupin said:

You agree that Trump did good by ending an Obama regulation that forced low-income housing onto suburbs yet you aren’t satisfied because he didn’t put that good action in a broader philosophical context.  Most people here would have liked to have seen that too but we can still appreciate what he did.  I can't understand this perfectionist attitude, where no matter what good Trump does it doesn't matter because he doesn't know what he's doing on a higher intellectual level, therefore replace him with Biden, who does know what he's doing.

I want to try to cut through some of this, because there are a million possible debates in a million directions.

So, to clarify what I think is maybe the most important issue you've raised: it is not that I'm dissatisfied because Trump didn't put some "good action" in a broader philosophical context; it is that I am dissatisfied because, in context, I do not consider it to be a good action.

If someone offered to give me a hundred dollars, I might consider that to be a "good action" in some abstract, isolated sense. I mean, hey, a hundred bucks. Nice. But if, as they offer me that hundred dollar bill, they prepare a club behind their back, meaning to hit me over the head as soon as I reach out to accept, their offer of the hundred dollars ceases to be good.

I do not believe that Trump is principled at all, except as I have said, in that he wishes to promote himself and that he wishes to have power over others (that, in fact, he is a dictator at heart). Everything else, including his seeming adoption of this stance or that, is a means to these ends. He was a "Democrat" when it suited him, as he is a "Republican" now, but I do not believe he is really anything, at heart. Just an endless black hole of want.

When Trump takes aim at Obama (because I think it is more this than regulation or even economic policy, as such; I think that Trump is guided far more by the politics of personality than principle), it provides him cover for certain people to offer a plausible-sounding defense of him. Does Trump care about Amy Coney Barrett? I don't believe so. But he wants the support of the religious and he's willing to sacrifice abortion for its sake. (Is Trump pro-life? Perhaps as much as he was ever supposedly pro-choice. If Stormy Daniels had gotten pregnant, what do you suppose Trump would have suggested she do?)

When I see Trump posing with a Bible, or claiming to love the book, is that because I believe he has ever read it? Or is a "believer" in any sense? No: he is pandering, lying. Again, he seeks their support and he is cynical enough to believe that there are people who will take him at his word, despite all of his actions and his entire existence. (And those Objectivists who take heart at Trump's supposed admiration for Rand or Atlas Shrugged or whatever should take note.)

By the same measure, does Trump care about the Proud Boys? I don't believe so. Is he racist? Perhaps in some banal way, but not as a matter of principle, no. I think he would sacrifice any or all of these pawns as soon as it struck him as expedient. I think he would embrace critical race theory tomorrow, make it mandatory training for government employees, if it struck him in whatever pre-conscious reptilian brain system he uses that this was the better path to consolidating or furthering his power.

In short, I don't think Trump gives a damn about any notion of individual rights or liberty. It isn't that he's intellectually unable to relate his actions to some philosophical principle, but that he doesn't have any such principles apart from his pursuit of power. A regulatory rollback here or there is a fig leaf of respectability; it is, as I'd suggested before, the worm on the hook. It is the way Trump makes use of better (but naive) people who do have principles, who do care about things, and puts them under his power.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

DonAthos,

Trump does something you acknowledge is good by itself, but in context it isn’t good.  

What happened to Biden in your analysis of this contextualized Trump?  What Biden has done – and will do if president – may appear bad by itself, but in context it isn’t bad.  ???

Coming up is an extraordinarily important election.  At this point our concern should be comparing Trump with Biden.  In that context I don’t much care if Trump is unprincipled.

Furthermore I think you are doubly wrong in the example of Trump rescinding the Obama regulation that forced low-income housing on suburbia.  Trump gave his reasons for doing it and they are good reasons.  No, he didn’t wax libertarian about property rights but he did come right out and say the regulation made suburbs less safe.  What president in the last fifty years would have the guts to point that out?

You need to show me the club or hook concealed behind what he did.

Trump posed with the Bible!  My God!  It makes Biden's China dealings look small and shabby in comparison.  I’m being sarcastic – let’s get some perspective here.

 

Edited by Dupin
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

34 minutes ago, Dupin said:

Trump does something you acknowledge is good by itself, but in context it isn’t good.

Right. In context, Trump's otherwise good-seeming actions are not actually good, because they inspire folks like you to support his agenda, which is not truly the promotion of liberty or individual rights, but his own power-lust and his willingness to subvert the system in the process of satisfying it.

And then, with that understood, we no longer have a sincere comparison between "good by itself" and "in context it isn't good": there is no such thing as "good by itself," in reality, as we must strive to understand and evaluate all things in context, to the extent we are able.

34 minutes ago, Dupin said:

What happened to Biden in your analysis of this contextualized Trump?  What Biden has done – and will do if president – may appear bad by itself, but in context it isn’t bad.  ???

Biden does not appear in my analysis of Trump. Biden is irrelevant to my analysis of Trump. Biden's faults, whatever they may be, do not lessen Trump's.

To draw a comparison between the two, Trump is a would-be dictator, Biden is not. Thus ends the (meaningful portion of the) comparison between them. I will not vote for a would-be dictator, but I will vote to stop him.

Biden will be bad from the perspective of individual rights (and should be supported only in that he will be better than Trump, and in that we can only truly choose between these two). Every politician who could be elected to such an office in our culture will be bad from that perspective, and this will continue until we have some kind of a fundamental shift towards reason. Currently we are "shifting" in the other direction, and as far as I can tell, Trump is himself accelerating that decline.

34 minutes ago, Dupin said:

Trump posed with the Bible!  My God!  It makes Biden's China dealings look small and shabby in comparison.  I’m being sarcastic – let’s get some perspective here.

Biden's China dealings? Are you referring to the story that the Wall Street Journal couldn't corroborate and wouldn't support?

You've waved a number of what I consider to be red flags, now, so it's time to address this directly. I was being a bit flippant when I'd raised QAnon before, but I have to ask, because I'd prefer we all have our cards on the table: is that where you're coming from, or near-to?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

DonAthos,

QAnon?  Earlier I posted a link to Rudy Giuliani.

From what little I’ve read about QAnon they sound like cranks.  But just because there isn’t a secret group of perverts ruling the world doesn’t make the Jeffrey Epstein case disappear.

 

Edited by Dupin
Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, DonAthos said:

To draw a comparison between the two, Trump is a would-be dictator, Biden is not.

I don’t agree with this. Explaining why requires two distinctions.

- Dictatorial about government policy versus dictatorial to the USA’s people in general.

- A dictator personally versus a dictator institutionally.

Trump shows a strong desire to control government policy. However, his desire to control people in general doesn’t seem strong to me. Indeed, a prime counter-instance is the health insurance mandate. Obamacare made the mandate – that people in general (with a high enough income) must purchase health insurance, and they will be penalized (“taxed”) if they don’t. Trump got rid of the mandate, calling it the worst part of Obamacare.

Joe Biden shows little desire to be a dictator personally. However, it seems he has little reservation about having in his orbit others who are very dictatorial, e.g. Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, AOC, Kamala Harris. If elected, his cabinet appointments will be very revealing. Another reason I say this is his persistent desire for higher taxes, even more spending, and more regulations. Implicitly or explicitly, he views a better world coming from government activism. Trump does not.

On the campaign trail, he has touted the “public option” regarding health insurance. If elected, I would not be a bit surprised to see him flip-flop to backing some form of Medicare for All (advocated by Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and Kamala Harris when they pursued the presidential nomination). Biden explicitly proposes to transition away from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. Of course, the transition will be forced via government intervention – regulations and subsidies.

How often have you heard Biden praise private industry or advocate individual liberty?


 

Edited by merjet
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, Dupin said:

From what little I’ve read about QAnon they sound like cranks.

If you say so. But your initial invoking of "Deep State" and "elite child sex slavery," among some other subsequent items, had me worried. It also brought to my mind other things like "Pizzagate" (ugh, another -gate), the notion that the massacre at Sandy Hook was a hoax, that the Clintons had Vince Foster whacked, etc., etc., etc.; QAnon being merely the latest incarnation of a seemingly endlessly evolving conspiracy theory that Democrats aren't merely evil in the typical regulatory/taxation/personal liberty fashion, but that they also drink the blood of babies a la the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

I've seen so many extreme theories over the years, as I'm sure you have as well, that over time one develops a bit of a reaction. One never really knows to whom one is speaking. So maybe this is a false positive. I'll allow it as a possibility. At the same time, there is your claim, for example, that "Russiagate" (which I do not, indeed, concede is a real thing at all) is "the highest crime ever in U.S. history," which again trips my sensor.

For after all, even if it were "an illegal attempt by men within the U.S. government itself to undo the election of a president," and not an investigation conducted by appropriate authorities based on at least plausibly suggestive information, it would still have to compete with, oh, Watergate itself (which was a -gate before -gates were cool) and illegal surveillance and secret experimentation and torture and treaty violations and secret bombings and assassinations and such. So "highest crime ever," to me, begins to sound like the kind of hyperbole one only usually hears in certain disreputable echo chambers -- the places where, again, QAnon-style theories are sometimes floated and tolerated and spread.

I should clarify that I'm not asking to debate the merits of "Russiagate," just as I wouldn't want to debate Sandy Hook if you subscribed to that theory. Rather, I'm trying to explain the reasons why I feel deeply skeptical about a number of your claims, and their sources.

Quote

Earlier I posted a link to Rudy Giuliani.

Again: if you're going to employ "fake news" earnestly, then you're going to have to demonstrate that you have some better personal discernment for your own sources.

Rudy Giuliani? From what I know about Rudy Giuliani, he sounds like a crank.

Quote

But just because there isn’t a secret group of perverts ruling the world doesn’t make the Jeffrey Epstein case disappear.

No, of course not. But neither does it make the case that Trump has some special interest in derailing sex abuse, that he is alone in fighting it, or that he has some special ability to do so.

(And were we discussing the Epstein case itself -- which I'd also rather we didn't -- it would then become necessary to explore Trump's own relation with the man, and possible history of sex abuse, etc. But none of that speaks to principles or fundamentals or the reasons why I believe Trump or Biden ought be preferred to the other.)

6 hours ago, merjet said:

I don’t agree with this.

Fair enough.

Quote

Trump shows a strong desire to control government policy. However, his desire to control people in general doesn’t seem strong to me. Indeed, a prime counter-instance is the health insurance mandate. Obamacare made the mandate – that people in general (with a high enough income) must purchase health insurance, and they will be penalized (“taxed”) if they don’t. Trump got rid of the mandate, calling it the worst part of Obamacare.

I don't read that the same way. I read it as a combination of pandering to his supporters and attacking Obama personally. I don't believe it has to do with Trump's desire, or lack of desire, to control people in general.

And with respect to "control," I don't think it some neurotic need in that Trump needs to micromanage every person to the last detail, but I believe that in any situation where he believes his interests require it, he would not hesitate to use governmental force against others, if he thought he could get away with it; and that he wants power, generally, to allow for this.

Quote

Another reason I say this is [Joe Biden's] persistent desire for higher taxes, even more spending, and more regulations. Implicitly or explicitly, he views a better world coming from government activism.

Joe Biden is a Democrat. I take all this as given.

Quote

Trump does not.

And here's where I disagree. I think Trump also views a better world coming from government activism -- at least, when it has his own imprimatur and serves his interest.

As an example, here's an item from earlier this year regarding Trump threatening social media platforms with regulation, or worse. And here he is, also from earlier this year, threatening companies which operate outside of the country. In the latter piece, Trump is quoted, saying of companies which produce goods outside of the US and his desire to "incentivize" them to produce here, instead, "One incentive, frankly, is to charge tax for them when they make product outside. We don’t have to do much for them. They have to do for us."

They have to do for us...?

I don't know that I've heard Biden praise private industry or advocate for individual liberty, and I wouldn't expect him to, unless pressed. (That said, I'd imagine that he has some regard for both "private industry" and "individual liberty" at least notionally; I don't read him as a Bernie Sanders-style socialist.) But Trump's position, it seems to me, is that "private" industry operates at the pleasure and discretion of the President and for the good of the people (or at least, the "people" who are good in Trump's eyes, which means: the people who support Donald Trump). If I had to summarize this, taken together with his nationalism, I think it's not wrong to describe Trump's approach to private industry and liberty as "fascist" in nature. I think he believes it all serves or ought to be made to serve the state -- at least, when he is, himself, the state.

I believe that Trump is constrained in his dictatorial urges only by the fact that we have a system of checks and balances and institutional inertia and minority protections (meaning: political minority) and so on -- but I believe that he has spent the last four years trying to weaken all of these safeguards, and that he will push things much further in that regard, if given the chance.

So here's a fanciful hypothetical I'll leave you with: imagine that Trump and Biden, each upon election, were given the option to utterly remake the US Government in giving dictatorial power to the Presidency, bypassing Congress, the courts, etc. They would no longer even have to run for office -- dictator for life. The new Caesar.

It's possible that Biden might accept such a thing, I'll grant, but I could also easily imagine him refusing it, in the name of preserving the system of American governance. That he would see some value even in preserving stops against his own authority. This may be my own naivete showing, but I would even expect that of him. But Donald Trump? He would refuse the crown? I think it's all he's ever truly wanted, and still what he's groping (if half-blind, half-dumb) towards.

Edited by DonAthos
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

7 hours ago, merjet said:

How often have you heard Biden praise private industry or advocate individual liberty?

I mean, Trump sure doesn't, unless lying counts as praise... The ongoing question in this thread is what evidence we even have that he actually advocates for individual liberty to any extent. Necrovore was making an extremely weak claim that Trump has some *semblance* of a belief in individual liberty somewhere in his barbaric mind, but not even he came up with examples. WhyNot tried to, but I tore that apart by showing a blatant contradiction in Trump's own behavior. 

Dupin at least wrote down something to argue about, rather than these vague assertions about the inevitability of Civil War, the communist takeover, and so on, with the exception of mentioning the deep state, which is the same paranoia.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 10/27/2020 at 4:08 PM, MisterSwig said:

But you don't have a right to stop people from peacefully living their lives, just because you are personally at risk of catching a disease from other people in society. If that were the case, we would need to quarantine everyone with the common cold every year.

I don't argue with the above. 

But, if one is sick, one should have the common sense to stay home until well.  If one sick person goes to work, knowing that one is sick, then that amounts to deliberately exposing others to illness.  In a civil society, one doesn't have the right to initiate pain or grief upon others.  That being said, in my opinion, just send the sick person home- "punishment" (as I read in another post) is inappropriate.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 hours ago, Eiuol said:

I mean, Trump sure doesn't, unless lying counts as praise.

Give us a break. He fairly often praises producers, although he often does include himself by saying "we" rather than "they."

Another reason to not vote for Biden is this. Democrats have a majority in the House. If Biden wins, Democrats will likely have a majority in the Senate. Progressives and authoritarians will take that to justify pushing their agenda.

Edited by merjet
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 10/27/2020 at 8:30 PM, DonAthos said:

I do not believe that Trump is principled at all, except as I have said, in that he wishes to promote himself and that he wishes to have power over others (that, in fact, he is a dictator at heart).

Characterizing Trump as a "dictator at heart" makes real dictators look like reasonable, elected leaders of America. You sort of have to want power over others in order to be commander in chief of the greatest military force on the planet. It is literally the president's job to order people around. That doesn't make him evil. Neither does promoting himself, which is part of reaching a larger audience for his message.

If Trump had, say, forced his son to hand over half his salary for decades, then you might have a case for "dictator at heart." 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

18 hours ago, Eiuol said:

The ongoing question in this thread is what evidence we even have that he actually advocates for individual liberty to any extent.

Here he is advocating liberty and freedom of speech for religious people very early into his presidency. "It was Thomas Jefferson who said the God who gave us life gave us liberty." (4:58)

If you listen to that whole speech, you should see his commitment to the freedoms outlined in the Constitution. This doesn't mean he perfectly applies the principle, but he's on record in several speeches upholding the idea. He has a baseline appreciation for individual liberty.

Trump's idea of individual liberty extends to business. He supported Tesla when Elon Musk defied county health orders during the lockdown. (1:15)

Again, he has a baseline appreciation for individual freedoms. And, in this case, I think it's a great sign that he sided with Musk. It shows his first inclination was to favor the liberty of individuals over the regulations of the state.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, merjet said:

Give us a break. He fairly often praises producers, although he often does include himself by saying "we" rather than "they."

If you keep reading, you'll see that I'm saying I think his praise is bullshit. 

12 minutes ago, MisterSwig said:

Here he is advocating liberty and freedom of speech for religious people very early into his presidency.

Okay, here you are trying to do something substantive about my claim that he is just lying and/or pandering. I'm not trying to say that he never utters something that I like the sound of. He definitely does. But presidents have speechwriters of course, it's not as if he came up with those words. He agrees with saying them, except I can't see where I should believe that he himself believes in these principles. In the speech you showed, he's talking about the origin of rights in God, and speaks highly of religion, and all that usual Christian stuff. Yet everything about his public persona, and his private way of speaking that we know about, and his moral action in the past, he is so far from being Christian even in philosophy. It's just more evidence that he is disingenuous about his statements. 

25 minutes ago, MisterSwig said:

Trump's idea of individual liberty extends to business. He supported Tesla when Elon Musk defied county health orders during the lockdown.

Yeah, but that contradicts how Trump himself claimed that he shut the country down as a response to covid. I talked about that earlier in the thread. You suggested that he was referring to shutting down travel with China, but he was definitely referring to shutting the country down as many people have wanted. 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 hours ago, Eiuol said:

The ongoing question in this thread is what evidence we even have that he actually advocates for individual liberty to any extent.

Getting rid of Obamacare's mandate to purchase health insurance or be penalized ("taxed') is not evidence?

--------

President Trump is no deficit/debt hawk. For fiscal years 2017-19 federal deficits and spending were higher than any of 2014-16 with Obama as President. Fiscal responsibility would have advised surpluses during 2017-19, when the economy was growing and after the 2010-16 recovery from the bad years 2008-09.

On the other hand, indications are that Biden is even less fiscally responsible than Trump. This article projects the deficit impact of Trump's and Biden’s COVID response plans for 2021-30. The deficits for Biden’s plan dwarf those for Trump’s plan. A breakdown of their spending plans is included. The Biden plan is larded with spending that is little related to Covid – forgiving student loan debt, child tax credits, nutrition assistance, education funding, paid emergency leave, greater unemployment benefits, and funding to state and local governments. Trump’s plan has none of these. The last two call for the most spending. Which state and local governments will get the bulk of the money is very predictable -- the most fiscally irresponsible ones. 

Edited by merjet
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, Jon Letendre said:

And like I said, we already you hate you the Trump movement.

What does the Trump "movement" have anything to do with what I said? 

But fine then. Who is Q supposed to be? Why do you think this is a place where people want to discuss it?

Edited by Eiuol
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Dupin said:

Biden is totally compromised.  As many have said, he should be in jail, not running for president.

Joe Biden Partnered with Chinese Communists for $30M
by Rudy Giuliani, 28 October 2020.

Looking at the video linked here, and thumbing through the comments, I see "reno 59" say:

"Okay so you have a mountain of hard core proof, Now go get the SOB!!!"

One reply, by "cat 11" reads, "They had all the proof on Hillary who put national security at risk by having top secret info on a home computer. Yet no charges or displinary action was ever taken"

And then another reply, by "Loki the sly one," reads, "He's been trying for years now. Everything he's foipund has been given to the authorities but they won't act because the fbi is covering for the Democratic party. That's why a lot of them were fired recently but im sure there's much more dirty people there and that's why theres been no charges on any of these crooked fucks"

______________________________

It's all so sad and painful to witness this. Dupin, you're being duped. These people are lying to you. They're using you. And I don't know why you're willing to buy into it, willing to be used in this manner, but that's what's happening here.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, Eiuol said:

But presidents have speechwriters of course, it's not as if he came up with those words. He agrees with saying them, except I can't see where I should believe that he himself believes in these principles.

Because it wasn't just a speech. He actually tried to get the Johnson amendment repealed. But Congress wouldn't do it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, DonAthos said:

... These people are lying ...

That is, lying about Biden's dealings with China.

Beside Rudy Giuliani’s testimony see
Interview of Tom Bobulinski (Tucker Carlson Tonight, October 27th 2020)
Bobulinski  is a businessman. He connects Biden to PRC – 20% equity in a deal (personally), brother 20%, son 20%, others the rest – "plausible deniability" around 17:45, falsely blaming Russia around 22:50.

I think Bobulinski  and Giuliani are telling the truth because they have documentation which can be checked for veracity, because they have no reason to lie about it and risk going to jail, and because of their manner.  Giuliani has a fairly good biography  (I don’t know Bobulinski’s).  The FBI has a long history of corruption –  see the books by Rodney Stich.  It’s no surprise they are dishonest yet again.

Quote

It’s so sad and painful ...

An act and a pathetic one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.

×
×
  • Create New...